In view of the fact that becoming obese due to body weight gain is not only undesirable for cosmetic reasons but also poses a greater risk for health that leads to life-style related diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia and the like; suppression of body weight gain is considered to be important for reducing the incidence of life-style related diseases. While suppression of body weight gain naturally requires sufficient exercise and balanced dietary habits, these alone are practically insufficient to achieve the goal and, as the situation stands, a method of appropriately controlling the body weight is not easy to find.
On the other hand, body weight gain of patients suffering from life-style related diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia and the like often causes aggravation of the illness. Since body weight gain is caused not only by way of ingestion of food but also sometimes by the administration of therapeutic agents for life-style related diseases, suppression of body weight gain of patients is also significant for the treatment of life-style related diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia and the like.
It has been known that insulin sensitizers recognized as highly superior therapeutic agents for diabetes (e.g., troglitazone, pioglitazone, rosiglitazone etc.) have a PPARγ agonistic activity (e.g., Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, 284, 751-759 (1998)). While these pharmaceutical agents are effective for the treatment of diabetes, some of them have been found to increase body weights of patients after their administration (WO 93/03724, Diabetes, 47, suppl. 1, A18, No. 69, 1998). Such drug-induced body weight gain is one of the effects desired to be avoided as much as possible for patients with diabetes. This is because obesity causes aggravation of diabetes.
For example, JP-A 5-271228, JP-A 2001-316296 and the like describe that a compound having an angiotensin II antagonistic activity shows a superior therapeutic effect for circulatory diseases and the like, such as hypertension, cardiac diseases, stroke, renal diseases, arteriosclerosis and the like. In addition, JP-A 9-323940 describes that a pharmaceutical agent comprising a compound having an angiotensin II antagonistic activity in combination with a compound having an insulin sensitizing activity and the like can markedly decrease the dose of each active ingredient as compared to the dose thereof used as a single agent, which in turn can decrease expression of side effects as compared to the use of the active ingredients as single agents, and can be advantageously used as a prophylactic or therapeutic agent for various angiotensin II-mediated diseases, particularly, as a prophylactic or therapeutic agent for arterial hypertension associated with arteriosclerosis or hypertension as a complication and the like.
JP-A 2001-316296 describes obesity, which is one of the metabolic/nutritional disturbances, as a target disease of a compound having an angiotensin II antagonistic activity. However, this publication does not report on the suppression of body weight gain (particularly, body weight gain induced by a PPARγ agonist-like substance) by a compound having an angiotensin II antagonistic activity, irrespective of whether excess weight (including obesity) is observed.